This invention relates to a handle for a striking tool such as a hammer, axe, pick, or the like, having a striking head with a passage transversely therethrough in which passage an end of the handle is accommodated. Such a handle is herein, for the sake of brevity, simply referred to as a handle of the kind described. The invention also relates to a striking tool including such handle.
Handles of the kind described have for a long time been of wood. Indeed, wooden handles are still being used at the present time. Such a wooden handle is usually fixed to the striking head by having one of the ends of the handle accommodated in the passage in the striking head and by having a wedge driven into that end of the handle. The wedge causes lateral expansion of the end of the handle and, as the passage generally increases in cross sectional area towards that end of the handle, this will tightly secure and lock the handle in position relative to the head.
There has, however, been a move away from wooden handles towards handles of materials which are not as prone to splitting or breaking as is wood, and which have more uniform and predictable properties than wood. Thus, the applicant is aware of a handle which has an elongate body of elastomeric material and a core of flexible steel rods or wires embedded in and extending longitudinally through the body. Such a combination of an elastomeric body with a steel core has been found to have decided advantages over the ordinary wooden handle. However, it has always been difficult to secure such a handle to a hammer head. In one hammer known to the applicant, recourse was had to passing the rods or wires into the passage and through a metal plate and providing the ends of the rods or wires by deformation with button formations to prevent their withdrawal from the plate. The plate was then welded to the hammer head. In another hammer known to the applicant the rods or wires were bent back on themselves, around a pin passing transversely through the hammer head and crossing the bore in the head. In both these hammers the rods or wires are thus secured to the hammer head prior to embedding the rods or wires in the elastomeric material. When the elastomeric material is subsequently moulded around the rods or wires, the material is also caused to enter the unoccupied space of the passage so as to become bonded not only to the rods or wires but also to the walls of the passage. The handles of these hammers are therefore permanent fixtures to the heads of the hammers and fixing of the handles to the hammer heads has to be carried out by the manufacturer. In other words the user has to buy complete hammers from the manufacturer and cannot buy only the handles and fit these himself to heads of his own choice.
Another problem with the above hammers having handles of steel and elastomeric material is that the handle is flexible in all longitudinally extending planes and has relatively low tortional stability with respect to the longitudinal direction of the handle. Applicant has found that it is undesirable to have the handle flexible in the plane in which it is swung in use. In other words, the applicant has found it to be undesirable for the handle to be able to bend about an axis normal to the plane in which it is swung in use. The resiliency of the elastomeric material has been found to be sufficient to absorb shocks when a blow is struck. However, it may be desirable to have the handle resiliently flexible in the longitudinal plane transverse to the plane in which the handle is swung during use. This is so because, as the head is usually elongate in the plane in which the tool is swung during use, the tool will, if it is left lying on the ground, take up a position in which the plane in which it is swung during use is substantially parallel to the plane of the ground. As the head has a certain thickness between its sides and the walls of the passage, the end of the handle near the head will be raised off the ground slightly. If the handle is not resiliently flexible in such plane, it will either break or be deformed permanently should a heavy downward load be applied to it, such as by a heavy truck riding over it.
It is an object of the invention to overcome or at least mitigate the above difficulties.